an Introduction and Notes by A. F. Johnson. Copyright 1928 by John
Lane, The Bodley Head, Ltd. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.
It is a curious fact that the title page was evolved at a comparatively
late date in the history of the book, and is indeed almost unknown
before the printed book. There are a few examples among early surviving
manuscripts of a separate leaf being used for the title, but they
are quite exceptional, and even these give the title on the back of
this leaf. The usual practice of the calligrapher was to give any
information considered desirable as to the author and the date and
place of the making of the manuscript in the colophon. This practice
was taken over by the printers, although in the first years of the new
art they frequently said nothing as to place of printing, probably
with the deliberate intention of concealing the fact that the book was
produced by mechanical means. The title page as we know it, giving
the title, author's name and an imprint, being, in fact, a kind of
advertisement of the book, was not well established until some years
after 1500....
The title page owes its origin, according to one theory, to the fact
that printers found it necessary to protect the first leaf of the
text. Whereas a manuscript would be bound as soon as the calligrapher
had finished the text, most of the copies of a printed edition were
delivered to a book-seller in sheets, and many might remain unbound for
years. Hence arose the practice of beginning the book on the second
leaf or on the back of the first leaf. The first page could then be
used for the purpose of advertising the book, for the fully-developed
title page arose out of a commercial need. A few early examples of the
addition of a brief title on the first page are known, the first being
that of a Bull of Pope Pius II, printed by Fust and Schöffer at Mainz
in 1463. But the blank title leaf is found for many years after that
date, and to the end of the fifteenth century a title leaf containing
a brief description in a few words is common. As late as 1548 we find
the brothers Dorici at Rome printing several volumes of the works of
Cardinal Bembo with the title on the back of the first leaf. An edition
of the Vulgate printed at Venice in 1487 by Georgius Arrivabene offers
an example of the most rudimentary form of a title page, with the
single word _Biblia_ on the first leaf.
The example of Ratdolt at Venice, who in 1476 printed a Calendar of
Regiomontanus with woodcut borders and an imprint on the first leaf,
was not followed by contemporary printers. Even this solitary case
hardly presents a title page in the form in which we know it, since the
leaf, in place of a title, has a poem in praise of the book. Of the
fully developed title page, giving title, author and full imprint, Dr.
Haebler, the German authority on incunabula, knows of only one instance
in the fifteenth century, a book by Johannes Glogoviensis printed by
Wolfgang Stöckel at Leipzig in 1500; the title itself, however, is cut
on wood.
The lettering of the simple fifteenth-century title page was often
that of the text of the book, or sometimes a larger, heading type was
used. Very frequently the words were cut on wood, and since for the
printer it was as easy to print from a block containing a design in
addition to a brief title, the woodcut illustration on the first leaf
soon followed. The examples of the John Lydgate, printed by Pynson,
_c._ 1515, and of the _Deceyte of Women_, printed by Abraham Vele about
1550, are typical title pages of popular books of the earlier printers.
In Spain especially this combination of title and illustration, in that
country often an heraldic cut, both cut on wood, became the fashion
and persisted for many years in the next century. Scenes from school
life often illustrated educational texts, while a school of woodcutters
at Florence designed a famous series of illustrations which decorated
the title pages of devotional tracts by Savonarola and other works.
The first printers' devices, the two shields of Fust and Schöffer and
the double cross rising out of a circle at Venice, were added to the
colophons, and it was only when the French printers began to use large
devices surrounded by borders, for which there was no room on the last
leaf, that the printer's name, or at least mark, began to appear on the
title page. Thus one further step was taken towards the title page as
we know it.
[Illustration: MACHIAVELLI, SOPRA LA PRIMA DECA DI TITO LIVIO, ANTONIO
BLADO, ROME, 1531. The formal Italic below the device, designed by
Lodovico Vincentino, the calligrapher, was used in many of Blado's
books. It has been revived and is known as Blado Italic. (Size,
5-1/2x8-1/4 inches.)]
The sixteenth century is especially the age of the woodcut title-border
(or metal-cut, for the material used for blocks was frequently
metal). The practice of decorating the first leaf of the text with a
woodcut border had been started by Ratdolt at Venice, and after 1490
was common among the printers of that city. In fact, several of the
borders originally used for an opening were actually converted into
title-borders after 1500. During the following century the variety
of borders used in all the countries where printing was practised is
remarkable. In Germany especially, during the years of the Reformation,
when the printing press was unusually active, a very large number of
decorative borders were cut, many of them by artists of the first rank,
including even Dürer and Holbein. The work of the Holbeins and Urs
Graf at Basle is well known to English book collectors. Perhaps less
familiar is the work of Hans Baldung Grien, Hans Weiditz and Daniel
Hopfer at Strasbourg and Augsburg, and that extraordinary series of
designs which appear on the Luther tracts printed at Wittenberg and
on similar works produced in Saxony. Many of these borders are highly
successful as decorative pieces. The fact that they are less familiar
to us may be accounted for by two circumstances. In the first place the
earlier book collectors were almost all collectors of the classics,
and the first writers on the history of printing, except in the matter
of the invention of printing, approached the subject from the point
of view of the student of the Greek and Roman classical writers. In
the second place the German printers cut themselves off from Western
Europe by clinging to the gothic letter after Italy, France and
finally England had adopted Roman and Italic, even for books in the
vernacular....
There is one point about the early woodcut borders which must seem
strange to the printer of today, and that is the suitability of the
decoration to the subject matter of the book. The sixteenth-century
printer naturally found it economical to ignore the fact that a border
originally intended for a Bible was not suitable for a medical work.
He did not regard it as incongruous to use a border depicting scenes
from Greek mythology on a French medieval romance. Even a printer of
the class of Jean de Tournes uses the same piece on the title page of a
_Xenophon_ and of a book of French verse. Nor was the average printer
very particular about the state of a block. Especially in England,
where the general standard was lower than on the Continent, a damaged
block would be used as long as it held together.
[Illustration: O. FINE, QUADRANS ASTROLABICUS, S. DE COLINES, PARIS,
1534. The border was probably designed by the author. His mathematical
diagrams are generally decorated with leaf forms like the "petits fers"
of this title. (Size, 7-5/8x11-5/8 inches.)]
In the second half of the century two rival fashions of decoration were
developed which finally banished the woodcut border, first the method
of decoration by type ornaments or printers' flowers, and secondly
the engraved title page. There is one example of type ornament known
even in the fifteenth century, in an _Aesop_ printed at Parma in 1483.
After 1500, examples of borders made up of separate cast pieces are
fairly frequent and are especially common in England in the books of
Wynkyn de Worde and his contemporaries. But it is not until about
1560 that we find borders built up of type ornaments worked into
arabesque patterns. It seems to have been Robert Granjon, the engraver
of types at Paris and Lyons, who cut arabesque fleurons, divided them
up and built up fresh patterns out of their component parts. The use
of printers' flowers in borders is found at most centers of printing
towards the end of the century and obtained its greatest popularity in
the Netherlands and in England. Many fine examples are found in English
books from about 1570 for the next fifty years. Joseph Moxon, who wrote
on English letter-founding in 1683, tells us that they were considered
old-fashioned in his day. They were revived again in the eighteenth
century by P. S. Fournier at Paris, who cut many new designs which were
copied all over Europe. Fournier's flowers could be built up to form
all manner of ornaments and were more adaptable than the arabesques
of the sixteenth century, when the original unit always resulted in
the same pattern. Just as Granjon had devised a method of decorating
without the use of the woodcut block, so Fournier designed his new
flowers in order that printers might dispense with engraved vignettes.
However, the vogue of the Fournier designs had a shorter life, and may
be said to have been killed by the classical school of printing of the
end of the century.
[Illustration: J. LONGLOND, A SERMON, LONDON, 1536. Wynkyn de Worde and
his contemporaries used cast pieces as ornaments, at least from 1504.
Although their use was frequent, the arrangement of this title page is
uncommon. (Size 5-1/4x7-1/4 inches.)]
Engraving on copper was practised in the fifteenth century, but
the engraved title page originates about 1550. Curiously enough, the
earliest known engraved border occurs in an English book, the Anatomy
of Thomas Geminus, printed in London in 1545. In the following year
we find a second example, cut by Corneille de La Haye for Balthazar
Arnoullet at Lyons, where there was a remarkable group of engravers
at work about this time. From 1548 the books of Enea Vico printed at
Venice begin the fashion in Italy, where, after 1550, examples are
fairly numerous. In the Netherlands also, beginning with the work of
Hubert Goltzius at Bruges, they are met with almost as frequently as in
Italy. It was, perhaps, Christopher Plantin at Antwerp who, more than
any other printer, made the engraved title-border the fashion for all
larger and more important publications. But it is with the seventeenth
century especially that engraved borders are associated. The Elzevirs
used them even on their pocket editions, while at the other extreme
the massive volumes issued at Amsterdam and at Paris in the reign of
Louis XIV are almost invariably introduced by an elaborate engraved
frontispiece....
[Illustration: DUGUÉ, ARIETTE, FOURNIER, PARIS, 1765. This rather
ornate border shows what could be done with Fournier's new type
ornaments. (Size, 7-1/4x10-1/4 inches).]
Perhaps the worst examples of these overloaded frontispieces are to be
found in German books of the period. Often, also, the engraved border
is only a bastard title, the proper title page being set up in type.
The earlier examples, dating from the sixteenth century, are in general
the best, being simpler and not yet overburdened with a mass of detail.
The good taste of the eighteenth century brought about a reform. But
at Paris most books of this period had a typographic title page and
the work of the famous school of French engravers was lavished on the
illustrations. However, the engraved vignettes of that age were often
very effectively used. Even Baskerville did not always disdain the
vignette, and it was the last form of decoration abandoned by Bodoni.
One other form of decoration may be mentioned, that of metal rules.
Rules have been used occasionally at almost all periods, by Geofroy
Tory, for example, among others. But as far as title pages are
concerned they are found most often in the seventeenth century.
[Illustration: THE DECEYTE OF WOMEN, A. VELE, LONDON, C. 1550. The
combination of black-letter and a woodcut is a usual title page in an
early English book. This undated example is probably mid-century, as
the printer, Vele, is not heard of before 1548. The cut seems to date
much earlier. (Size, 5-1/4x7-1/2 inches.)]
The purely typographic title page is naturally of greater interest
to the modern producer of books. At all periods the title page which
was effective mainly by the arrangement of type has been common, and
at most periods there have been printers who preferred to dispense
with ornament of any kind. In the sixteenth century the books of the
Paris printer, Michel de Vascosan, illustrate this severer manner,
and the classical style of the great printers at the close of the
eighteenth century was likewise independent of decoration. Some sort of
arrangement of the letters displayed on the title page suggested itself
from the first, and very soon various shapes were tried. Perhaps the
commonest arrangement was the conical one, or the so-called hour-glass
shape, in which the lines of type begin by being long, to become short
at the center, lengthening again in the imprint at the foot. Others
have preferred a natural arrangement, printing the matter exactly as
if on a page of the text. Geofroy Tory, a book producer whose work was
of great importance in the history of the book, seems to have been
against the fashion of his day in his choice of the natural layout. It
has certainly been the usual custom to aim at some sort of pattern in
the division of the lines of type. In this respect the earlier printers
had one advantage which was not enjoyed by their successors. They felt
no difficulty about dividing a word in a title, even when the second
part of the word was to be set in a different size or even a different
kind of type. Frequently we find examples of such breaks in words as
custom has made impossible for the modern printer. The simplification
of the task for whoever was responsible for the layout is obvious. One
rule which seems to have been almost universally observed is that the
mass of the type must be in the top half of the page and not evenly
distributed. [Page 69.]
Equally important with the distribution of the matter is the
question of the kind of type to be used, the sizes of type, upper- or
lower-case, and the number of different fonts. The simplest manner of
using the letter employed in the text met with little favour and was
soon displaced by the use of larger types and especially by the use of
capitals. The heavy, square Roman capitals, like those of Froben at
Basle, for the first line, with smaller capitals for succeeding lines,
were more or less customary in Northern Europe in the first quarter
of the sixteenth century. In some countries a mixture of a "lettre de
forme" and Roman capitals was not unusual at the same period. With the
introduction of the new Garamond romans at Paris about 1530 began the
fashion of using the Canon and Double Canon sizes of the lower-case
letters for titles. In the seventeenth century we find large and heavy
Roman capitals again in favour, often balanced by a woodcut ornament
or a basket of flowers. This century, undoubtedly the worst in the
history of typography, notwithstanding the Elzevirs, is especially
remarkable for its crowded title pages. It had become the custom to
give as much information as possible about the contents of the book and
the qualifications of author, editor, etc., and the printer took the
opportunity of displaying as large a variety of his types as possible.
No doubt the use of title pages as posters for advertising is partly
responsible for the custom. It has been established by documentary
evidence that such methods of advertising books were usual in England
and in Germany, and probably this was so in other countries also.
Incidentally it may be pointed out that the posting up of title pages
accounts for some of the early collections, such as that of Bagford,
now in the British Museum. Bagford has been attacked for his vandalism
in mutilating books for the sake of his hobby, but it now appears
that he may have been quite innocent of the charge. In any case the
result on the title page as a specimen of typographical arrangement was
deplorable....
[Illustration: ISAIAH THOMAS, A SPECIMEN OF PRINTING TYPES, WORCESTER,
1785. As with most type specimens, this early American title page
displays many different types and flowers. (Size, 5-3/8x7-5/8 inches.)]
With the eighteenth century title pages became simpler and letters
became lighter, and the result is again work as good in its different
style as that of the sixteenth century. The eighteenth century is
certainly a great period in the history of book production, with its
center in Paris. In England the influence of Caslon and Baskerville at
length raised our typography to a level with Continental work. For one
innovation P. S. Fournier is mainly responsible, the introduction of
outline and other decorative capitals which were so successfully used
at Paris. At the end of the century we have the work of the Didots and
Bodoni, the classical school, whose technical achievement has hardly
been surpassed at any period. One may cavil at their conception of the
ideal shape of letters, one may dislike their excessive use of hair
lines and their flat serifs, but it must be admitted that as practical
printers and type-cutters their work was of first rate quality. These
classical printers were proud of their types and wished them to stand
alone. Bodoni, who at the beginning of his career used ornaments copied
from Fournier and engraved vignettes, in his later years more and more
abandoned decoration and outline letters. The classical title page is
composed in Roman capitals of varying size, but without the admixture
of lower-case letters or italics and without the aid of decoration.
Like Baskerville, these printers considered that type is itself
sufficiently interesting to stand alone.
Lawrence C. Wroth
THE FIRST WORK WITH AMERICAN TYPES
From _Typographic Heritage_. Copyright 1949 by The Typophiles.
Reprinted by permission of the author.
On 7 April 1775 there appeared in Philadelphia the initial issue of
Story & Humphrey's _Pennsylvania Mercury_. This newspaper was referred
to by a contemporary diarist as "The first Work with Amer. Types" and
with certain qualifications, later to be made, it seems to be entitled
to the distinction of priority implied in this descriptive phrase.
Type founding in the colonies went through those phases of tentative
effort, complete failure, and partial achievement which are normal to
the beginnings of great industries, and before going on with the story
of the font of type from which the _Pennsylvania Mercury_ was printed,
it is proposed to give briefly an account of earlier attempts at the
establishment of letter founding in English America. By doing this it
will be possible to secure correctness of sequence and of relationship
among the several elements of this study in origins.
The first font of types cast in English America was that which
resulted from the painful efforts of Abel Buell, a silversmith and
lapidary of Killingworth, Connecticut. Shortly before 1 April 1769
Buell cast a small font of letters, crude in design and in execution,
from which proofs were taken for the examination and the criticism of
his friends. In October of the same year, using a different and much
better type of his own making, he presented to the Connecticut Assembly
a printed petition in which he asked that body for financial assistance
in his proposed establishment of a letter foundry. In reply to this
memorial he received a loan from the colony for the purposes of his
venture, and soon afterwards he removed to New Haven and prepared to
manufacture type for the printers of a continent. The story of his
failure at this time, and of his success on a much smaller scale twelve
years later, is a part of the present study only in the sense which has
been indicated in the introductory sentences.
[Illustration: _Abel Buell's First Font. From a proof of May 1769.
Courtesy of the Yale University Library._]
Buell was not without a rival in his ambitious plans. David Mitchelson
of Boston, possibly acting under the direction of John Mein, a printer
of that city, is reported by a contemporary newspaper writer to have
attained as great a degree of success as the Connecticut silversmith
in the difficult art of letter casting. In the _Massachusetts Gazette
and Boston Weekly News-Letter_ for 7 September 1769 there appeared
among the local news items a report on recent developments in
American manufacturing activities in which are certain sentences of
interest in the story of colonial type founding. "We are assured by a
Gentleman from the Westward," said the writer, "that Mr. Abel Buell,
of Killingworth in Connecticut, Jeweller and Lapidary, has lately,
his own Genius, made himself Master of the Art of Founding Types for
Printing. Printing Types are also made by Mr. Mitchelson of this Town
[Boston] equal to any imported from Great-Britain; and might, by proper
Encouragement soon be able to furnish all the Printers in America
at the same price they are sold in England." The absence of a known
specimen of Mitchelson's letters or of any specific information as to
his operations is enough, however, to require a verdict of "not proven"
on any claim to priority in American type casting that has yet been
made on his behalf.
Because of the unfruitful nature of the enterprises which have been
spoken of, the year 1770 found the American printer still dependent
upon European importation for his printing type, and at the moment
there existed little prospect of relief from a situation which in the
years of the Revolution was to become a hardship rather than the simple
inconvenience of the earlier period. The policy of non-importation,
however, was stirring the colonies to the establishment of local
manufactures, and under the whip of necessity, type founding, among
other essential industries, was to take its rise in the United States.
The carrying to success of this manufacture in Pennsylvania in the year
1775 was undoubtedly assured by the political and economic situation of
the country, but its beginning, which must first be described, had its
cause in a set of circumstances of a more general character.
"The secular history of the Holy Scriptures," wrote Henry Stevens,
"is the sacred history of printing." In these words the Vermonter
gave sententious expression to the truth that the printing of the
Bible has been in all ages an appreciable factor in the development
of typography. The successful beginnings of type founding in English
America, it is believed, may be traced to the desire of Christopher
Sower Jr. of Germantown, Pennsylvania, to issue a third edition of
that German Bible which first had made its appearance at the pains and
expense of his father in the year 1743. It is said that the younger
Sower's dissatisfaction with the conditions of type importation from
Germany led him to conceive the idea of importing thence matrices and
moulds instead of finished type, and with these placed in the cunning
hands of Justus Fox, his journeyman, of casting his own letters for use
in the proposed edition of _Die Heilige Schrift_. An enterprising man,
a religious zealot, and the proprietor of one of the most extensive
printing offices in America, he was able, partly at least, to carry out
his intention.
[Illustration: _Abel Buell's Second Font, October 1769. Courtesy of
the Connecticut State Archives._]